rubadubdub
New Member
- Joined
- Jul 22, 2006
- Messages
- 5
This has been kicking around for a bit, but Football_Bat’s breeder/**** trophy thread (and for some reason, some of the comments on the Dakota Fanning thread) really got me thinking about it tonight.
For some of us stuck in the single-and-childless segment of society, it’s not always by choice. Once upon a time, I had plans to meet the perfect girl, have the storybook romance, raise a few kids and live happily ever after, but society doesn’t seem to want that to happen.
I’m now well past 40, haven’t had a date in almost three years and have every expectation of dying alone and unloved. It’s not that I don’t want children, I’ve just never found a willing accomplice.
(I will say that I have no idea if I could even handle parenthood. As ****ed up as I was growing up, I’d hate to think what some child in my care would turn out to be like.)
I realize the nature of the business has a lot to do with this — hell, I’ve been doing this for about 18 years now — as does working in a relatively small market where there isn’t a lot to chose from. Of the almost-decent nightspots to hit around here, most close shortly after our crew gets off work any way.
It’s just that it seems like I’m to be denied the opportunity to even fail on my own. Like because you weren’t one of the cool kids in school, you’re never going to be allowed to have a life (no matter how many times some asshole tells you to get one).
Part of my situation stems from working at a an extremely paranoid place where sexual harassment allegedly lurks around every corner. Did you know just looking at a girl can be grounds for a complaint? (Every paper in the chain had to offer “sensitivity workshops†to make sure all us cretins behave correctly; it seems that just about the time I arrived, they had to run off the copy desk chief for his attempts to woo one of the page designers.) While there is no company policy against dating a coworker, I got warned off pretty much every single woman in the building shortly after being hired, and this without having met several of them.
That was exacerbated by our newsroom floorplan — the first desk I was assigned to sat directly outside (and facing) the women’s restroom. The first few days I was there, I’d hear a door open, reflexively look up and more often than not be confronted with a female staffer giving me a dirty look. The fact that we have a female ME didn’t exactly help matters.
While nothing was every officially said, I just got the feeling that I was being labeled the creepy new guy in sports. Our ASE, whose desk was just a few feet left of mine, told me he also found the arrangement less than comfortable. I got lucky in that another staffer left the place, so I quickly commandeered his old desk — well out of the danger zone — before a replacement could be hired.
Even if I haven’t skeeved off every woman in the building, other areas are just as barren. Most of the other females I deal with either coach or play on the teams I cover. Since the vast majority of our coverage is high schools, that eliminates all of the under-age athletes.
An assistant football coach I deal with once suggested that I ask out a new female coach at his school. That got shot down when his head coach/AD quickly explained why I probably shouldn’t (something about my being as masculine as she was). OK, so female coaches are also off-limits.
Now that I’m getting old enough to have a child of high school or college age, it has been suggested I find a divorced mom of one of the athletes. That might be acceptable in some places, but not here. I work in a two-school town where everyone is convinced that the damn newspaper favors the other place. All I need is for someone to cut loose with the gossip that a kid got written up in the paper just because his/her mom is ****ing the sports writer.
Even if a woman my age doesn’t have a child involved in sports, there would be some connection to one school or another that would prove my favoritism. I couldn’t even date a kindergarten teacher without somebody claiming that showed how I rooted for the high school those kids would attend in another 10 years.
One thing I’ve had to constantly deal with, and not just in my present location, is the shallow, fickle nature of single women in my age bracket (which may be why they’re single at that age). I’ve heard too many times how they want a guy who will be supportive and sensitive and all other kinds of Dr. Phil bull****, then get shot down because of my income, my car, my haircut or something else that would appear to be a superficial matter.
I’m too country for the city girls, too citified for the country girls (I have actually been told no simply because I don’t wear Wrangler jeans), too tall for the short girls, too fat for the athletic girls and too white for the ethnic girls. Being too poor for the rich girls, of course, goes without saying. Hell, I never even get to find out if we have any common interests or not.
I’ll be the first to admit I’ll never be mistaken for Brad Pitt, but I’m also not going to be confused with the guy from the Ohio State library, either.
I’m just tired of having to explain that, no, I’m not gay, I’m just a pathetic loser who can’t get a girl. I’m still not sure Mom believes me.
I shall now log back on under my normal secret identity and mercilessly lambaste the pathetitard who posted this pussified drivel.
For some of us stuck in the single-and-childless segment of society, it’s not always by choice. Once upon a time, I had plans to meet the perfect girl, have the storybook romance, raise a few kids and live happily ever after, but society doesn’t seem to want that to happen.
I’m now well past 40, haven’t had a date in almost three years and have every expectation of dying alone and unloved. It’s not that I don’t want children, I’ve just never found a willing accomplice.
(I will say that I have no idea if I could even handle parenthood. As ****ed up as I was growing up, I’d hate to think what some child in my care would turn out to be like.)
I realize the nature of the business has a lot to do with this — hell, I’ve been doing this for about 18 years now — as does working in a relatively small market where there isn’t a lot to chose from. Of the almost-decent nightspots to hit around here, most close shortly after our crew gets off work any way.
It’s just that it seems like I’m to be denied the opportunity to even fail on my own. Like because you weren’t one of the cool kids in school, you’re never going to be allowed to have a life (no matter how many times some asshole tells you to get one).
Part of my situation stems from working at a an extremely paranoid place where sexual harassment allegedly lurks around every corner. Did you know just looking at a girl can be grounds for a complaint? (Every paper in the chain had to offer “sensitivity workshops†to make sure all us cretins behave correctly; it seems that just about the time I arrived, they had to run off the copy desk chief for his attempts to woo one of the page designers.) While there is no company policy against dating a coworker, I got warned off pretty much every single woman in the building shortly after being hired, and this without having met several of them.
That was exacerbated by our newsroom floorplan — the first desk I was assigned to sat directly outside (and facing) the women’s restroom. The first few days I was there, I’d hear a door open, reflexively look up and more often than not be confronted with a female staffer giving me a dirty look. The fact that we have a female ME didn’t exactly help matters.
While nothing was every officially said, I just got the feeling that I was being labeled the creepy new guy in sports. Our ASE, whose desk was just a few feet left of mine, told me he also found the arrangement less than comfortable. I got lucky in that another staffer left the place, so I quickly commandeered his old desk — well out of the danger zone — before a replacement could be hired.
Even if I haven’t skeeved off every woman in the building, other areas are just as barren. Most of the other females I deal with either coach or play on the teams I cover. Since the vast majority of our coverage is high schools, that eliminates all of the under-age athletes.
An assistant football coach I deal with once suggested that I ask out a new female coach at his school. That got shot down when his head coach/AD quickly explained why I probably shouldn’t (something about my being as masculine as she was). OK, so female coaches are also off-limits.
Now that I’m getting old enough to have a child of high school or college age, it has been suggested I find a divorced mom of one of the athletes. That might be acceptable in some places, but not here. I work in a two-school town where everyone is convinced that the damn newspaper favors the other place. All I need is for someone to cut loose with the gossip that a kid got written up in the paper just because his/her mom is ****ing the sports writer.
Even if a woman my age doesn’t have a child involved in sports, there would be some connection to one school or another that would prove my favoritism. I couldn’t even date a kindergarten teacher without somebody claiming that showed how I rooted for the high school those kids would attend in another 10 years.
One thing I’ve had to constantly deal with, and not just in my present location, is the shallow, fickle nature of single women in my age bracket (which may be why they’re single at that age). I’ve heard too many times how they want a guy who will be supportive and sensitive and all other kinds of Dr. Phil bull****, then get shot down because of my income, my car, my haircut or something else that would appear to be a superficial matter.
I’m too country for the city girls, too citified for the country girls (I have actually been told no simply because I don’t wear Wrangler jeans), too tall for the short girls, too fat for the athletic girls and too white for the ethnic girls. Being too poor for the rich girls, of course, goes without saying. Hell, I never even get to find out if we have any common interests or not.
I’ll be the first to admit I’ll never be mistaken for Brad Pitt, but I’m also not going to be confused with the guy from the Ohio State library, either.
I’m just tired of having to explain that, no, I’m not gay, I’m just a pathetic loser who can’t get a girl. I’m still not sure Mom believes me.
I shall now log back on under my normal secret identity and mercilessly lambaste the pathetitard who posted this pussified drivel.
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